Burnt Ash
by AmaryllisWhimsy
Summary: "The brightly colored bird, yellow, orange, and red as the sun, would constantly end in a fiery death. Then it would rise once more from ashes, and the cycle would start all over again. Burn and rise, burn and rise, burn and rise, burn and rise. That's Sasuke, Naruto thought. Only every time he rises, his heart becomes more charcoal than muscle." One-shot.


**This popped into my head at about five o'clock in the morning, for no apparent reason. I usually write Disney one-shots, so this is a little different for me. I do not own Naruto or any of the characters, but the writing is my own.**

**OooOooO**

At first, before he learned to control himself and his inner demon, Naruto burned within at the change.

Into the fox form, that is. His insides lit up in a blazing inferno, filling his stomach with hot flame that licked at his core. He could feel it in his bones, and he could feel it more than anywhere else in his soul.

After, when he was himself once more, all cerulean eyes, and unkempt blonde hair, when the red chakra had faded, his soul was like charcoal. Or at least, it felt like it. Black and chalky, smeared within. Or else like ash that would blow away with a cool wind.

That was the thing. He burned _within. _Other burn victims understood each other, and related to one another through the fact that they'd all been through the same thing. Burnt - a painful and horrific experience that marred a person. They never forgot it, they never truly got over it, and Naruto, Naruto burned wholly within. He was like them and unlike them, as with almost all the things he was in life. Alike and Unlike. Similar and Dissimilar. Almost one of them, but not truly a part.

And so, for the longest time, he burned alone. He didn't always truly understand when it happened. A flicker here and there, like an ember of flame trying to raise up once more. But the feeling was familiar, and at the very least, better than the cold empty that had once or twice tried to linger permanently upon him.

Once he made friends, things were different. He fought the fire. He resisted it's tempting, bright, pull, he desperately wish that he had the power to diffuse it. It wasn't entirely his fault that he could not, for two reasons.

1. That the fire belonged to the fox, and despite the popular belief of the time, the fox was a separate being entirely from Naruto.

And

2. That fire could not be fought with fire.

He could not stop the flame with a forceful flame of his own.

OooOooO

The first time Naruto realized that Sasuke also burned within, it was when he left. Forever, leaving Naruto for dead, wet, and on the ground. Naruto had looked within those dark, obsidian eyes and saw what he had often fought within, he saw flame, he saw a blaze revealing everything he had decided not to be, and everything Sasuke had embraced.

After the incident he had come across a story about a creature called the phoenix. The brightly colored bird, yellow, orange, and red as the sun, would constantly end in a fiery death. Then it would rise once more from ashes, and the cycle would start all over again. Burn and rise, burn and rise, burn and rise, burn and rise.

_That's Sasuke_, Naruto thought. _Only every time he rises, his heart becomes more charcoal than muscle._

OooOooO

If a person could burn with hate, it was Sasuke. And if a person could burn with love, it was Naruto. And Sakura, she burned with nothing, which was why she could never fully understand.

It was not her fault, and it was not her fate. Sakura could be gentle as rain, her fingers binding wounds and fixing broken limbs. But she could also be a hurricane, smashing everything in sight, demolishing what she touched. A tsunami, a wall of water that stubbornly resists all advice or wisdom.

She stormed, not burned, and therefore her understanding was limited merely to what she could imagine. Storms build, like fires do, except fires must be fed and storms simply _happen. _Sakura's emotional outbursts were almost as a surprise to her as everyone else.

She had reasoned this out, back when Naruto trained with Jiraiya, and Sasuke had left them for keeps. Naruto had changed his fire so that when he fed it, only love could be born, and Sasuke fueled his fire with pure vengeance and hatred.

And Sakura knew that you couldn't fight fire with fire, but she did know that you could fight hate with love, and although it was something of a paradox, she truly believed Naruto could do it.

OooOooO

Rise from the ashes. You must. You must rise above the flame and the hatred, you must find your wings and soar.

Naruto did. He soared upon the wings of fire.

"_Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone."_

_-Edith Cavell_

OoooOooO

**Please leave an honest review! I'd very much appreciate it.**


End file.
